


Negotiation

by Tenukii



Category: Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)
Genre: Dom/sub Play, Falling In Love, M/M, Pining, Revised Version
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2019-10-02 11:08:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17263142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tenukii/pseuds/Tenukii
Summary: Lonely and frustrated, Al Cody dumps his distant girlfriend and makes a deal with Llewyn Davis: Llewyn can crash at Al's apartment as long as he follows Al's rules.  It would be the perfect arrangement if Al didn't know Llewyn will leave once he gets what he wants.





	1. Chapter 1

When Al Cody’s intercom buzzed in the middle of the night and woke him up, he knew Llewyn Davis must be at the door.  No one else was that inconsiderate.

Al got out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen, then leaned on the intercom button.

“Yeah?” he mumbled.

“Al.  ‘S Llewyn.”  His voice was slurred.  “Can I come up?”

Al leaned his forehead against the wall and yawned.  If he said no, Llewyn might go away, but then Llewyn might also keep buzzing until Al gave up and let him in.  And anyway, Al would feel bad in the morning if he left Llewyn out on the street.

“Fine,” Al groaned.  He mashed the button to unlock the front door then slumped on the wall and dozed while he waited for Llewyn to come up the stairs.  When Al heard an uneven knock on his door, he opened it.

“Hi,” said Llewyn.  He was drunk, but at least he hadn’t gotten himself beat up again.  The bruises from the last time had nearly faded, and all that was left of his black eye was a faint yellow stain on his unshaven cheek.  He stood in the hall, wobbling a little, and looked up at Al through his eyelashes with his eyes half-closed.

“Get in here,” Al muttered when Llewyn didn’t do anything else but stand there and wobble and look.  Al grabbed the smaller man’s arm and hauled him inside so Al could lock up and go back to bed.  He pulled harder than he meant to, and the momentum sent Llewyn stumbling into the kitchen table.  He turned and leaned back on it, bracing himself on his hands as he stared up at Al again.

“Fuck, you’re strong,” Llewyn purred, almost moaned, and licked his lips.  “Why you throwin’ me around, Al?  You mad at me?”

“It’s the middle of the fuckin’ night,” said Al.  He locked the door and put the chain on it, then looked at Llewyn again.  It was a warm night and he wasn’t wearing a coat, just a long-sleeved shirt that wasn’t especially clean.  He wasn’t carrying anything either.

“Where’s your stuff?” Al asked.  “Your guitar and shit.”

“Oh.  I dunno.”  Llewyn never took his eyes off Al’s face.  “I’ll prolly ‘member in the morning.”  He pushed himself off the table and came closer to Al, still looking at him like that.

“I gotta get back to bed,” Al mumbled.  “Gotta work tomorrow.”

“Want some company?” asked Llewyn.

_Fuck,_ thought Al.  It wasn’t the first time Llewyn had come on to him while drunk—always and only when he was drunk—and each time, Al found him more difficult to resist.

But he said, “No.  Go sleep on the couch.”  He had started to edge past Llewyn, back toward his bedroom, when he thought of something else.  “And for God’s sake, stay out of the liquor.  And the cigarettes.  Last time you stayed over, you cleaned me out.”

“Sorry,” said Llewyn.  “I’d buy you more, but I’m broke.”  He moved closer again, covering the distance Al had edged away and then some.  “Want me to make it up to you?  I’ll blow you.”

“Fuck.”  Al said it aloud that time.  “ _No_.”

“You’re the big successful music star here,” Llewyn was saying, as if he hadn’t heard Al’s refusal.  He sidled ever closer.  “You already got it all—place to sleep. . . recording contract. . . booze.”

Al had backed up to the wall and couldn’t get away when Llewyn suddenly pressed up against him and reached up to snake one arm around his neck.  Llewyn pressed the palm of his other hand against the wall, trapping Al on either side, and leaned into the taller man’s bare chest.

“Girlfriend,” Llewyn went on.  “Friends.  Money.  You got a home, Al, I got nothing.  Can’t give you anything but a good time.”  He dropped his hand off the wall, shoved it between them, and grabbed Al’s dick through the pajama pants he was wearing.

“Fuck!” Al groaned again.  The back of his head hit the wall, and he tilted his face up with his eyes shut.  The thought of Llewyn going down on him had him half-hard already, and when Llewyn’s small hand closed over his cock, it stiffened the rest of the way.

“Fuck,” agreed Llewyn breathlessly.  He squeezed Al’s erection and groaned, “Shit, you feel fuckin’ huge.”  Al’s hips bucked forward against his hand, and Llewyn grinned.

“Get off, Llewyn,” Al growled.  He grabbed Llewyn’s shoulders and tried to shove him away.

“The fuck you think I’m trynna do?”  Llewyn started grinding on Al’s thigh.  He was as hard as Al was.  “I’ll blow you, or you can fuck me, I don’t care.”

“You’re wasted, Llewyn,” Al told him.

“So?” said Llewyn.

“And you said it yourself, I got a girlfriend.”

“So?” Llewyn repeated.  “I don’t see her here right now, and this feels like you need it too.”  He fondled Al’s erection then gripped it tightly as he lurched upward on his toes to crush his mouth against Al’s.  He tasted awful, like cigarettes and shitty beer, but Al shoved his tongue in Llewyn’s mouth anyway.  His hand came up and clenched into Llewyn’s tousled hair, and his other hand closed over Llewyn’s ass, and Al thrust into Llewyn’s hand and kissed him.  Between Al not getting laid in months and Llewyn being a cock-tease every time he got drunk, Al _did_ need to get off, and his body went on autopilot.

Llewyn whined and squirmed and bit Al’s lips with his hard kisses.  If Llewyn hadn’t pulled back after a moment, Al might have lost it altogether, but the brief reprieve from Llewyn’s demanding mouth let his head clear just enough.  Llewyn pulled on his shoulders, trying to get him over to the couch, but Al put his hands on the smaller man’s chest and pushed him away again.

“Back off and leave me alone!” Al snapped at him.  “Go lie down and sleep it off.  I’m sick of this—sick of you showing up every time it rains or you’re broke or hungry or cold, and you trashing the place and eating all my food.”

Llewyn stared up at him.  He even had the audacity to look kind of hurt.  He hadn’t shaved in a while, not even to shape up his beard, and he needed a haircut and a shower too.  All that aside, Al still wanted to fuck him, and the hurt look might have been calculated, anyway.  Llewyn was good at pulling the wide-eyed needy look that got to Al every time, got him in the heart _and_ the dick.

Then Llewyn said again, “You can fuck me—I’ll let you do whatever you want to me.  Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it.  _Anything_ if you’ll let me stay.”  His eyelashes dropped, and the hurt-needy look started turning to horny-needy, like he liked the thought of Al dominating him.

“I already said you can stay.  Go crash on the couch,” muttered Al.  He already felt bad about his outburst, but Llewyn probably wouldn’t even remember it in the morning.  Al turned and stalked past him, ignoring Llewyn when he said Al’s name in a desperate, raspy, fuck-me voice.

Back in his bedroom, Al slammed the door but didn’t lock it.  If Llewyn crawled into bed with him and started blowing him, well, no one could hold Al accountable.  A man shouldn’t have to lock his bedroom door in his own apartment.

But Llewyn didn’t follow him to bed, and Al lay on his back and tried to go back to sleep alone.  He wished he’d stuck to his guns when he broke up with his girlfriend, instead of making up with her.  Not that kissing Llewyn and rutting into his hand hadn’t been cheating on her, but it was less cheating than fucking Llewyn would be.

\--

Lizzie had come down from Boston after Al sent Llewyn off to Chicago.  He hadn’t seen her in about a month, and even when she started in on how shitty his apartment was and how much she hated New York, he was still looking forward to fucking her.  But then he made the mistake of taking her to see a play in the Village, some beat rewrite of Aristophanes modernized to protest the Vietnam War.  Johnny Five had told Al about it, and if he hadn’t been in Al’s mother’s car with Llewyn on his way to Chicago, Johnny probably would have gone too.  Or been in the damn thing himself.

Either way, Al decided it was Johnny’s fault he and Lizzie saw _Lysistrata,_ and therefore Johnny’s fault Al didn’t get laid that night, or the next, and wouldn’t have gotten laid the _next_ night either even if Lizzie had stayed in New York for the three nights she’d planned, instead of storming back home to Boston on Thursday, a day early.

_Lysistrata_ had given Lizzie an idea (although Al wondered how she hadn’t heard of the play before, since she was always boasting about her degree from Amherst).  As they walked back to Al’s apartment, she told him that Lysistrata had been on to something, and Lizzie would be withholding sex starting from that very moment.

“But _I’m_ not fighting the war,” said Al.  He laughed, because he thought she was joking.

“I don’t mean because of the war,” she said.  “We shouldn’t be having sex before marriage, anyway.”

“We’re not,” said Al.  “Or not much anyway.  You hardly ever come down—”

“You hardly ever come up,” she said.

“—and you don’t want to do it much when I _do_ see you.”

“Your schlong’s too big,” she said.  “It hurts when we have sex.  But that’s not the point, or why I’m withholding.”

“You’re withholding until I marry you?”  Al had supposed he’d marry her one day, but “one day” had always been a pretty vague, abstract concept of time for him.

“Until you stop dicking around down here,” she said, “and start living a real life again.”

They’d gotten to Al’s building, and he stopped outside the front door to stare at her.

“What do you mean, a real life?”

Lizzie glared up at him and said, “Quit playing singing cowboy.  Get out of this dump—”  She gestured at the apartment building.  “—and move back to Short Hills or where the fuck ever, just anywhere but New _York_.  Get a real job.”

“I _have_ a real job,” Al argued.

“You work in a grocery store,” said Lizzie.  “I mean, get a _career_.”

“I _have_ a career,” said Al.  “I signed a contract the other day.  I’m getting royalties on a song.”

“And you still have a crate of shitty albums under your table that you can’t _give_ away,” said Lizzie.  “Music’s a career if you’re Liberace, or Sinatra.  It’s _not_ a career if you’re Arthur Milgrum, no matter how many fake names you make up for yourself.”

Al was used to hearing that, and not just from her.  It was what his parents thought too, along with just about everyone from back home.

“Fine,” he said.  “No sex.  Got it.”  He turned to the door and let them in, and he slept on the couch that night.  He was pretty sure Lizzie was bluffing and would sleep with him the next night, but he jacked off on the couch anyway, out of spite.  And out of spite, he didn’t think about sex with her while he did it.  Instead, he thought about stuff he’d wanted to try—some of it stuff you could do with a girl but not with a girl like Lizzie, a lot of it stuff you could only do with a guy.

So Al got off masturbating and thinking about nobody in particular. . . just a guy.  Even though he had dark curly hair, and deep brown eyes, and a perfect, pretty mouth, the guy wasn’t _specifically_ Llewyn Davis.  Just somebody.

Somebody who wouldn’t tell Al that his music was shitty or that he didn’t have a real job or that his apartment was a dump (even though it was).  Somebody who wouldn’t bitch that his dick was too big when Al plowed him.

Al would be the one in charge, for once, even though he’d spent his whole life doing what others told him to do: his parents or his boss or his girlfriend; his professors or Jim or Johnny or fucking _anybody_ , because Al was a nice guy.  Nice and friendly and cooperative.  But this time, Al wouldn’t be nice at all.  He’d be kinky and dirty and possessive.  Al came pumping his cock and imagining the guy who wasn’t Llewyn kneeling there between his legs, blowing Al and looking up at him with adoration in those deep brown eyes.

The next night, when Al was on the couch again because Lizzie _wasn’t_ bluffing, he came thinking about not-Llewyn straddling him and bouncing on his cock with his arms and legs wrapped around Al’s body and his head thrown back, whining with pleasure and need.

The night after that, Al was back in his own bed because he’d broken up with Lizzie, and she’d gone home in a rage.  Al lay in bed and thought about being free to find the man he’d never known he wanted.

But the next day, Al’s mother called him freaking out, because the police had called to tell her someone found her car abandoned on the side of a highway hours away.  Al made up a story about how Johnny had taken the car without asking.  Consequently, Al spent the rest of the day on the phone with his mother and the police, and with Jim as well since Al realized he had no clue what had happened to Llewyn.  Eventually, Al learned that Johnny was in jail, and Llewyn was back in New York, and the old guy who’d been paying Johnny to drive him around was in a hospital somewhere in a coma he might not ever wake up from.

And then Lizzie called Al that night, crying and apologizing and promising she wouldn’t be a nag anymore.  Al was tired, and he felt bad for making her cry, and he was already feeling bad for lying about Johnny and the car even if Johnny probably deserved it, so he took her back.  He even apologized.

Llewyn showed up at Al’s place again, the night he’d gotten beat up.  He turned up here and there over the next few weeks whenever he couldn’t stay outside and he didn’t have anywhere else to go.  Llewyn would hit on Al when he showed up drunk, or when he got drunk on Al’s liquor, and Al got honest with himself about his fantasies.  They’d always been about Llewyn.

\--

Al hadn’t seen Lizzie since the _Lysistrata_ incident, and Llewyn had been right there in his kitchen giving him that needy look, and now Al couldn’t get those fantasies out of his head.  After all, Llewyn had never come out and _said_ Al was a shitty singer, just looked at him weird, and Llewyn didn’t care where Al worked or what his apartment was like.  If Al could just keep him drunk all the time, Llewyn would be the perfect partner.

But Al knew that in reality, Llewyn would leave, once he was sober and he didn’t need Al for his couch or his liquor or his smokes.  And anyway, Al had a girlfriend.

Nevertheless, Al gave in and jerked off thinking about Llewyn so he could get it out of his system and get to sleep.  He imagined going back to the living room and grabbing Llewyn by his curly hair and cashing in on that blowjob Llewyn had offered, imagined Llewyn’s brown eyes looking up at him through those dark lashes with the look of adoration Al craved.  Al’s teeth clenched and his balls drew up, and then he came hard with one hand pumping his cock and the other stretching his pajama pants by their elastic waistband, holding them down and out of the way so Al’s cum splattered his stomach instead of messing them up.

Afterward, he fumbled around on the nightstand for some Kleenex and cleaned himself off, then dropped the used tissues on the floor to pick up in the morning.  Al pulled his pants up and was finally able to fall asleep.  His last waking thought was to wonder if Llewyn would gone when he got up.

\--

To be continued


	2. Chapter 2

Llewyn was still there in the morning.  When Al woke up after sleeping through his alarm and stumbled to the bathroom, he heard the shower running.  He pounded on the bathroom door.

“Hurry up!” Al yelled through the thin wood.  “I’m gonna be late for work.”  He heard the shower curtain rings scrape on the rod and imagined Llewyn sticking his head out past the curtain.

“It’s not locked!  I’m not stopping you from coming in,” Llewyn bellowed.

Al went in and left the door open to let some of the shower steam out into the hall.  He couldn’t see anything past the curtain, which Llewyn had drawn closed again, so Al went to the toilet to piss quick, before Llewyn finished and got out and saw him.  When he was through, Al started to reach for the handle without thinking, but he stopped himself just in time.  Flushing the toilet with the shower running would pull all the cold water from the pipes and scald Llewyn.  Instead, Al put the lid down and turned to the sink to wash his hands.

The shower stopped while Al was lathering up to shave.  He fixed his eyes on his own face in the mirror, but he could still see his single towel hanging on the rack right behind him.  Al watched it, waiting for Llewyn to snake a hand out and grab it to dry off behind the shower curtain.

But then Llewyn shoved the curtain aside and stepped out of the shower, naked and dripping water on the cracked linoleum floor Al tried to scrub clean periodically, whenever he thought about it.  Llewyn looked like a drowned cat.  His curly hair was soaked nearly straight and plastered to his forehead and neck, and what body hair he had was flattened to his chest and arms and legs.  He hadn’t shaved.

Although he knew he shouldn’t, Al raked his eyes over the smaller man’s body.  Llewyn started drying his chest with the towel, and Al’s gaze dropped to his hips.  They had the slightest of curves to them, like Llewyn put on a little weight there the second he got enough to eat, and they were smooth with the hair only starting close in to his cock.  That was mostly but not completely soft, and Al wondered if Llewyn had jerked off in his shower.  That thought made _his_ cock start to swell a little, and Al tore his eyes away and fixed them on his own face again.

Al scraped the razor down one cheek before noticing out of the corner of his eye that the towel wasn’t moving anymore.  He glanced back at Llewyn’s reflection, up at his face this time, to find Llewyn’s sultry brown eyes staring right at him.  Llewyn had stopped drying off and was just standing there, towel pressed to his chest like he’d forgotten how to use it, and that made Al think Llewyn had caught him checking out his dick.  Al’s face flushed under its coat of shaving cream.

He finished quickly and got out of there while Llewyn was still toweling off, but when he got to the kitchen and looked at the clock, Al realized he wasn’t going to make it to work on time, no matter what.  He groaned to himself and trudged to the phone to call in.  Al fully intended to say that he was running late and would get to the grocery store as soon as he could.  Then as he was dialing, Llewyn came out of the bathroom and wandered into the kitchen wearing nothing but Al’s towel wrapped around his waist.  Al heard himself say he was sick and wouldn’t be in to work that day at all.

After Al hung up the phone, he went over to the refrigerator to find something for breakfast.  Llewyn leaned against the wall by the door, watching him.  Al had some milk, so he grabbed a box of Corn Flakes off the top of the fridge, but then swore under his breath when he realized he hadn’t done the dishes in a while, and none of the bowls was clean.

“Fuck it,” Al muttered.  He cupped his left hand and shook some cereal into it.

As Al was popping a few flakes into his mouth dry, Llewyn said, “I know you said I can’t touch your smokes or your booze, but what about your Corn Flakes?”  Al turned to face him, chewing, and held out his hand.

“Don’t have any clean bowls,” he told Llewyn, “but here, knock yourself out.”  Al found this to be awfully funny, and he chuckled and waited for Llewyn to tell him to go fuck himself.  But Llewyn looked up at his face and down at his hand; then he pushed off the wall, reached out to grab Al’s wrist, and leaned over to eat a mouthful of cereal out of his hand.

“Thanks,” he said, chewing loudly.

“Fuck,” said Al.  He started getting hard as soon as he felt Llewyn’s lips moving against his palm.

“And thanks for letting me stay last night,” Llewyn added before he put his free hand under Al’s and lifted it so he didn’t have to lean over so far.  This time, he licked Al’s palm and scooped the Corn Flakes up with his tongue.

“You were pretty trashed,” Al mumbled.

“I wasn’t _that_ trashed,” Llewyn said with his mouth full of cereal.  He had to be getting thirsty, but he didn’t complain.

“Yeah you were,” argued Al.  “I’m surprised you even remember me saying that about the cigarettes.”

“I remember everything you said to me,” retorted Llewyn.  He swallowed then continued, “You said that you’re tired of me—actually, that you’re _sick_ of me, and you don’t want me coming here anymore.”  He looked down at Al’s hand, which was now empty even though Al was still holding it out, and Llewyn was still cradling it in his.

Llewyn asked, “Can I have some more cereal?  This’s the first I’ve eaten since yesterday noon.”

Al tugged his hand free, stuck it in the box, and pulled out another handful of Corn Flakes.  Llewyn grabbed his wrist again and went back to eating out of his hand like it was a normal thing to do.

“I knew this’d happen, you’d end up hating me.  Everyone always does.  So I won’t come back after this, I’ll leave you alone,” Llewyn mumbled into Al’s palm.  His breath was warm on Al’s skin, and Al marveled at how big his own hand looked cupped in Llewyn’s small ones, against Llewyn’s pretty mouth and scruffy chin.  It was probably all calculated, just like the needy looks Llewyn gave him with those dark eyes, but Al felt terrible knowing that Llewyn thought he hated him.  Somehow he got the feeling that part wasn’t calculated.  That part, Llewyn really believed.

“Llewyn,” Al breathed, “I don’t hate you.  I never said I hated you.  And I didn’t mean I was sick of _you_ , or that I don’t want you coming over anymore.”  He looked at Llewyn’s tousled, drying hair and lifted his free hand towards it before curling his fingers and dropping his hand again.

Llewyn looked up and said, “Yeah?”  There was a single Corn Flake left in Al’s cupped palm.  Al picked it up between his thumb and finger and put it to Llewyn’s lips.  Llewyn put out his tongue, drew it up the underside of Al’s finger, then curled it around the flake and flicked it into his mouth.

“Yeah,” rasped Al in a voice that felt husky.  “Llew, I was tired last night, but it ain’t that I’m tired of _you_.  I like you.  What I’m tired of is you only showing up when you need something, and then drinking _all_ my booze and smoking _all_ my cigarettes.”

“So I can still come by?” Llewyn asked him softly.

“Yeah, you can come by.  You can come by whenever you want, but. . . but we’re gonna have to have some rules.”

Llewyn looked up into Al’s eyes from under half-lowered lids and a curtain of black lashes.

“Okay,” he said.  “Tell me the rules, Al.”

Al’s hand was sticky where Llewyn had had his mouth all over it, and he scrubbed it against the leg of his pants before he spoke again.

“Like I said, you can come whenever you want, and you can leave whenever you want.  But while you’re here, you gotta do what I say,” Al told Llewyn.  “You want a smoke, you ask first.  You want a drink, you ask for that first too.  You want _anything_ , you ask me nice.”  Hearing himself say the words, and seeing the submissive way Llewyn was looking at him with his lips parted and the tip of his tongue visible just behind them, made Al bolder.

“I won’t ever tell you no, Llew,” he breathed, “long as you ask nice, and you haven’t—haven’t been bad.”

“Bad?”  Llewyn’s heavy eyebrows lifted a fraction of an inch.  “What counts as bad?”

“Taking without asking, or not following the rules.” Al informed him.  He paused, heart pounding so hard he could feel the pulse in his neck.  “Disobeying me.”

“And if I’ve been bad, I don’t get any cigarettes or booze?”  Llewyn’s pupils were dilating under his lashes.

“If you’ve been bad, you don’t get anything but punished,” Al told him.

“ _Fuck_.”  The word came out of Llewyn’s mouth as a groan, and when Al looked down, he could see Llewyn’s erection tenting the towel slung around his waist.  Llewyn followed Al’s gaze and started to adjust himself, but Al grabbed his hand and snatched it away.

“I didn’t say you could touch yourself,” he whispered.

Llewyn drew in his breath with a sharp hiss to ask, “And I don’t get to touch myself if I’ve been bad, right?  Not until I’ve been. . . punished.”

“Right.”  Al made his voice sound controlling enough, but his hand was trembling where it still gripped Llewyn’s.  He took a shaky step forward until their bodies were close enough for him to feel heat rising from Llewyn’s bare chest.  Al repeated, “Not until you’ve been punished, and you ask me nice.  _Real_ nice.”

Llewyn’s eyes fixed on Al’s again, and he whispered, “Like this?”  He moved closer still until his chest pressed against Al’s robe, put his lips up to Al’s neck, and whispered, “Please let me do it, Al.”

Al shivered.  Llewyn’s arms snaked around his shoulders and pulled Al to him so that Al’s throbbing cock was trapped between them and he could feel Llewyn’s erection against his thigh.

“Please,” Llewyn murmured.  He touched Al’s neck, first with his hot breath and then with his lips.  “Please, can I touch myself?  I’ll let you watch.”  Al couldn’t formulate any noise more articulate than a groan, and Llewyn exhaled a breathy laugh against his neck.

He tortured Al with the slightly throaty, petulant whine of his voice: “I’m so hard for you.  I wanted you last night, Al, wanted you to hold me down and fuck my mouth, then bend me over and fuck my ass.”  His lips spread open along the tendon along the side of Al’s neck, and Al felt Llewyn’s tongue there, wet and hot.

Al didn’t know if Llewyn meant it or was just making shit up as he went, but he had ceased to care.  He dropped his hands to Llewyn’s ass and squeezed it through the towel.  Llewyn pushed back into his hands and whined.

“You want me to fuck that pretty mouth of yours,” Al growled, “and this pretty ass?”  He felt Llewyn nod and one of his hands work its way between them.  When Llewyn shoved his hand down the front of Al’s pants and closed over his cock, Al moaned.

“Yeah, I want—Christ, Al, you’re fuckin’ _hung_.”  Llewyn drew back, breaking character entirely, and Al nearly moaned again, out of frustration that once more, his damn cock was going to ruin things.  But then Llewyn grabbed the waistband of Al’s pants and yanked them down to his thighs.  Both his small hands wrapped around Al’s shaft and explored it with an eagerness and greed Al’s girlfriend had never shown him.

Was Llewyn faking it, or. . . .   _Or does he really want this?_ Al wondered.  He decided he had to know for sure before he let things go any farther.  It took every ounce of willpower Al possessed to grasp Llewyn’s hands and pull them off his cock.  Llewyn flung his head up to stare at Al with his brow furrowed in confusion.

“Llewyn, do you really wanna do this?” Al asked him.  “You can say no.”

Llewyn’s face relaxed, and his eyes searched Al’s for a minute before he clarified, “I can leave whenever I want, right?”

Al nodded.

“And when I come back, you’ll take me in?  You’ll let me stay as long as I follow the rules?  As long as I do whatever you say?”

Al nodded again.  But then, as he looked down into Llewyn’s eyes, Al felt something small and warm and not entirely unwelcome stir in the center of his chest.

He blurted out, “Llewyn, when I say you gotta do what I tell you, I don’t—I don’t mean. . . .”  Frustrated with himself, Al bit down on his lip and looked at the wall over Llewyn’s head.

Llewyn sighed, “Al, I know—” but Al spoke over him.  Llewyn _thinking_ he knew what Al was trying to say wasn’t enough.

“I ain’t gonna throw you out if you don’t wanna fuck, or blow me, or whatever,” Al muttered.  “We can pretend I am, but I—I ain’t gonna force you.  I never want to hurt you, Llewyn.”

“Al,” said Llewyn, and he waited until Al finally looked at him again.  Then Llewyn said, “I know, I know you won’t hurt me.  You’re just about the only person who never has.”  For the briefest instant, Llewyn’s steady gaze faltered, but then his hand closed over Al’s cock again.  A few quick pumps had it back almost as hard as before, and Al’s knees went weak.

“Nngh, Llew,” Al panted.  He tilted his head back and bucked forward into Llewyn’s grip a few times, then took a couple steps back until he could sit down in the nearest chair at the kitchen table.  By then, Llewyn had tugged the towel free of his waist and dropped it on the floor.

He looked down at Al and whispered, “Tell me what to do, Al Cody.”

Al kicked his pants the rest of the way down and off, then spread his legs and thrust into Llewyn’s fist again.

“Blow me,” he ordered.  “Get on your knees and blow me.  Do a good job, and I’ll get you off.”

Llewyn used his foot to push the towel up closer to Al’s chair then fell to his knees on it, between Al’s thighs.  He cupped a hand behind the head of Al’s cock, leaned forward, and hesitated.

“Been a while since I did this,” he muttered, kind of apologetically.  Al started to ask again if Llewyn was sure he wanted to, but before he could speak, Llewyn bent over Al’s erection and licked the tip.  Al hissed at the feel of Llewyn’s tongue lapping at him roughly.  Llewyn wrapped his hand around the base of Al’s shaft and began to pump it slowly as he enveloped the head in his mouth.

Al tilted his head back and breathed, “Oh fuck, Llew!”  Llewyn sucked on him a few seconds, then lifted his head and let Al’s cock pop out from between his lips.

“I’d break my fuckin’ jaw if your prick was much bigger,” Llewyn grumbled.  He licked the head again and pressed the tip of his tongue into the slit so deep, Al gasped then groaned deep in his throat.  Llewyn gave a soft moan himself, nearly a purr, and murmured, “You taste good.”

“Suck it then,” Al panted.  “If you like how I taste so much, suck it, Llewyn.”  He raked a hand through Llewyn’s dark curls, and Llewyn shuddered.

“Make me,” he growled.  “Show me how to be good for you.”

Al’s fingers clenched into Llewyn’s hair and tugged, gently at first then hard enough to push Llewyn’s warm mouth back down on his cock.  Llewyn hummed around it with a soft “mmm”; then his eyes dropped closed as he lowered his head farther.  Al watched the first couple inches of his shaft disappear between Llewyn’s lips.  Llewyn gagged slightly when Al hit the back of his throat, and Al quit pulling on Llewyn’s hair but kept his fingers laced through it.  Llewyn drew back, dragging his lips over the shaft until they caught on the ridge of the head, then dropped back down again.  When Llewyn opened his eyes and looked up at Al’s face, never stopping the slow bobbing of his head, Al nearly came.

“Fuck, that’s so good,” he whispered.  He put his other hand to Llewyn’s hair and stroked it, petting him.  “You look so good with my cock in your mouth, Llewyn. . . so pretty.”

“Mmmnnh,” Llewyn replied.  The vibration of his mouth made Al shudder.  Llewyn’s eyes closed again the next time he pulled back, black lashes dusting his cheeks in a way that would have made his face look downright feminine if not for the beard.  Then Llewyn dropped down further than before to take Al’s cock back in.  Llewyn gagged a second time, but he didn’t stop.  Al gave a strained moan as he felt Llewyn’s throat relax and his cock sink in deeper, until Llewyn’s lips closed over the base of Al’s shaft.

“Oh fuck, shit, Llew—!” Al groaned incoherently.  No one had ever deep-throated him before, and the sensation sent him over the edge.  The sight of Llewyn like that with his closed eyes watering, the feeling of his throat clenching around Al’s cock, the strangled sounds he made—it was all hotter than anything Al had imagined, and he gripped Llewyn’s head with both hands as he started to come straight down Llewyn’s throat.  Al tried not to thrust upward for fear it would hurt Llewyn, but he couldn’t keep from trembling in quick little jerks as he orgasmed.  Llewyn pulled back with a retching noise but then immediately clamped his lips around Al’s shaft just below the head and swallowed Al’s cum.

Al collapsed back in his chair as his hands slipped from Llewyn’s hair to hang limply at his sides.  While he tried to catch his breath, still twitching all over from the intensity of his climax, Al stared down at Llewyn crouched between his legs.  Llewyn looked back up at him with spit and cum at the corners of his mouth and his eyes still watering a little.  After he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, Llewyn grinned.

“Was that good enough for you, Al Cody?” Llewyn asked in a hoarse, scratchy voice.  He braced his hands on Al’s thighs and pushed himself up to stand between Al and the kitchen table.  Llewyn was so hard, his cock was pressed up flat against his stomach, where it had smeared precum over Llewyn’s tan skin.

“Fuck, Llewyn,” breathed Al.  He stood up too and towered over Llewyn.  Al pushed the smaller man back against the table and went on, “Yeah, I’d say that was good enough, for a start.  And since you did good, I’ll get you off like I promised.”  He put his hands on Llewyn’s sides and slid them over his hot skin down to his hips.  Llewyn whimpered and rocked his hips forward.

“You gonna fuck me?” he hissed.  Al thought he could probably get it up again, but he shook his head.

“No, you gotta come back if you want your ass fucked,” he told Llewyn.  He let go of Llewyn’s hip with one hand and trailed his fingertips up the smaller man’s shaft.

“Oh, I’ll come back.  I got something to prove now,” Llewyn promised, flexing his hips to thrust his cock against Al’s hand.  He looked up into Al’s face again with his eyelids half lowered.

“Yeah?  What’s that?”

“That I can be just as good as anyone else.”  Llewyn licked his lips and reached up to hook an arm around Al’s shoulders before he finished, “That I can be the best damn lay you’ll ever get, Al Cody.”

Llewyn tightened his arm and drew Al down toward him, although his dark eyes pulled Al in just as much.  When Al was close enough, Llewyn lurched forward to catch his mouth.  Al groped Llewyn and kissed him, and Llewyn writhed against him until Al wrapped both arms around his waist and boosted Llewyn up to sit on the table.  The table wobbled a little, and Al thought it might give up and just tip right over, but then it steadied and held under Llewyn’s weight.  When Al pulled his mouth away from Llewyn’s, the smaller man whined.

Al warned him, “No complaining, or you don’t get to come.”  At that, Llewyn fell silent except for a trembling breath, and to reward him, Al applied his mouth to Llewyn’s neck.  He kissed along the bottom edge of Llewyn’s beard, then down his neck to his bare chest.  He bit one nipple, and Llewyn yowled.  Al mumbled against his stomach, “Yeah, that’s better, that’s it.  Sing for me, baby.”

Al reached between his own legs to grab the edge of his chair and drag it over so he could sit down.  As he pushed Llewyn’s thighs apart and kissed them both, Llewyn whimpered and squirmed; then he leaned back to rest on his elbows when Al gave his chest a light shove.  Llewyn watched while Al licked his cock and tasted the precum leaking from it.  Underneath that, Llewyn tasted like Al’s soap.  He was cleaner than Al had expected, and Al liked going down on him even though he’d never really enjoyed giving head before.

Llewyn yelped in surprise when Al slid his hands under Llewyn’s thighs and tipped them up until he was nearly flat on his back.  Then Al leaned forward and started rimming him, and Llewyn yowled, “Fuck-fuck-fuck- _fuck_!”  His bare feet scrabbled on the table’s surface as he tried to spread his legs even farther apart.  Al dug his fingertips into the flesh of Llewyn’s thighs and held them still while he flicked his tongue rapidly; then when Llewyn relaxed a little, Al drove it in deep.

Llewyn writhed on the tabletop and begged Al not to stop.  Al didn’t.  He liked making Llewyn squirm, liked feeling him come apart into a thrashing, whimpering tangle of limbs and fingers latched into Al’s hair, holding Al’s head down between his legs.  Al had the vague notion that he should be making Llewyn behave better than that, but he decided he’d do a better job of dominating Llewyn next time.  Right now, all he wanted was to make Llewyn come.

Al slid a hand up Llewyn’s thigh, over his hip, and onto his cock.  Llewyn had been cussing in a litany of mumbled oaths, but when Al started jerking his cock and tongue-fucking him in the same rhythm, Llewyn yelped, “Oh _shit!_ ”  His back arched, and he started coming even before his hips slammed back down hard on the table.  Llewyn bucked upward a couple more times until he’d finished; then he clawed at Al’s hair and wailed, “Oh fuck stop-stop-stop, Allll!” when he got too sensitive.

Al let him go and slumped back in his chair.  Llewyn lay flat on his back with his chest heaving and thighs trembling, and Al sat there and watched him while he caught his breath.  Finally, Llewyn pushed himself up to sit on the edge of the table and looked down at the trails of cum on his stomach and chest.

“Fuck,” he said.  “I gotta take another shower—I’m seeing a guy about a gig later.”  Then Llewyn looked over at the clock and swore louder, “ _Fuck_.”

He disappeared into the bathroom again.  (Later, when Al went to shower, he would find that Llewyn had used up the last of the hot water.)  In the meantime, Al pulled on his pants and made coffee and started doing the dishes.  Since he was taking the day off, he decided, he might as well clean up the place.

Llewyn came out of the bathroom mostly naked but pulling on pieces of his clothing as he came across them, scattered around the apartment.  When he sat down on the couch to put his shoes on, Al looked at Llewyn’s shirt over the edge of his coffee mug.

“You ain’t getting a gig wearing _that_ ,” he told Llewyn.  “Did you ever remember where you left your guitar and shit?  Because you need to change shirts.”

“Yeah, shit’s with the Gorfeins,” Llewyn muttered.  Al didn’t know who that was, but he nodded.  Llewyn went on, “Don’t have time to go there first, I’m meeting the guy near here.  In—mother _fuck_ , in fifteen minutes.”  He jumped to his feet.

Al sighed, “Wait there, just a second,” and went back to his bedroom after setting his coffee on the counter.  He found a clean white button-up shirt and brought it and his comb back to the kitchen, where Llewyn was fidgeting by the door.

“Here,” Al said as he threw his shirt at Llewyn.  “Change into this.”  Llewyn caught the shirt and held it while he stared at Al a second; then he stripped off his own shirt and put Al’s on.  It was too big in the shoulders and too long in the arms, but Llewyn buttoned it up anyway.  Al took Llewyn’s dirty shirt from him, balled it up, and dropped it on a chair.  When Llewyn was through with the buttons, Al tucked the clean shirt in, shoving the hem down inside Llewyn’s pants, then managed to roll up the cuffs where they didn’t look too bulky.

“Another rule,” Al informed Llewyn.  “Next time, you’re bringing all your clothes over and washing them, because you can’t keep wearing my shit.  It’s too big on you.”

“I didn’t ask to wear it,” said Llewyn.

“Yeah but you ain’t getting any gig wearing _that_ filthy thing.”  Al jerked his head over at the chair and Llewyn’s shirt.  He grasped Llewyn’s chin and held it still while he raked the comb through the shorter man’s damp curls.

“Al, I’m gonna be late,” Llewyn whined.  Al combed the hair back from his forehead and let him go.

“Go on then,” Al said.  He tossed his comb on the table and picked up his coffee again.

“Yeah,” said Llewyn.  He went to the door, turned back, and touched Al’s long fingers wrapped around the coffee mug.  “Thanks, Al.”

“Yeah,” said Al.  Llewyn smiled at him, small and quick with a quizzical look in his eyes; then he was gone.  Al finished his coffee and the dishes.

When he started going around the apartment gathering up old mail to toss out, Al noticed Llewyn’s shirt again.  He thought about throwing it in with the laundry he was going to do, but he changed his mind.

_That’s one of the rules,_ Al decided.  _He does his own laundry.  Including the shirt of mine he borrowed, if he doesn’t ruin it.  If he even comes back for his own shirt._

_If he even comes back._

\--

To be continued


	3. Chapter 3

 Al didn’t know if Llewyn would come back or not.  Maybe he would, or maybe if he scored the gig and had cash for a little while, he’d stay away.  Nevertheless, Al called Lizzie that night and broke up with her.  Even if he never laid eyes on Llewyn Davis again, Al knew what he wanted now, and it wasn’t a girlfriend up in Boston.

“How do I know you mean it this time?” Lizzie argued over the phone.  “Last time you dumped me, it didn’t stick.  You’ll call me in a couple days and say you were drunk or something and didn’t mean it.”

“No,” said Al, “I won’t, because I do mean it.”

“Fuck you, Arthur,” said Lizzie.  “What is it this time?  Why d’you wanna break up?”

“I met somebody,” said Al.  She started laughing.

“Like hell.  What is it this time, really?”

Al hung up on her, watched the clock, and counted off seventy-three seconds before the phone rang.  He didn’t answer it.

That was Monday night.  The phone rang again after about half an hour then was silent until six the next morning.  Al didn’t answer it either time because he thought it was probably her.

Late Tuesday afternoon, it rang again, and Al picked up at the last minute.  For some stupid reason, he thought it might be Llewyn, but it was Al’s mother.  He talked to her and told her he’d broken up with Lizzie, and his mother said good but would it stick this time.  It would, Al said.

Five minutes after they said goodbye, the phone rang again.  Al sighed, “Yeah, Mom?”  He was used to her forgetting to tell him something on the phone and calling him back right away.

“Fuck you,” came Lizzie’s voice over the phone, and Al hung up on her.  She didn’t call back again that week.  Llewyn didn’t call either (Al wasn’t sure he even had the number, but then he could get it from Jim or the phone book if he remembered Al’s real name), and he didn’t turn up at the apartment again, not even on Friday night when Al had sort of expected to see him.

That night, Al lay flat on his back in bed, staring up into the dark and wishing he’d fucked Llewyn over the kitchen table when he’d had the chance.

“He ain’t coming back,” Al said to the darkness.

Saturday night, Al went out to a country bar to see one of his buddies play, an authentic cowboy from near Memphis.  Al got almost but not quite drunk, and he probably could’ve picked up one of the girls hanging around the bar, but he decided to go home alone instead.  He didn’t want any girls.

When Al came up Downing Street just after midnight, Llewyn was asleep on the stoop outside the apartment building with his guitar and a couple bags beside him.  Al nudged Llewyn’s thigh with the toe of his cowboy boot.

“Took you fuckin’ long enough to get home,” Llewyn mumbled without opening his eyes.  Al picked up one of the bags, opened the door, and stepped over Llewyn to get inside.

“Get off your ass and quit complaining,” Al said to Llewyn over his shoulder.  “I told you, you don’t get shit if you complain.  But if you behave yourself, maybe you’ll earn a spare key.”  He didn’t look back, but he listened hard.  Al heard scuffling as Llewyn got to his feet and gathered up the rest of his stuff, followed by the tired shuffle of his feet as he followed Al upstairs to his apartment.

Llewyn dropped his bags and guitar case in the living room, in front of the sofa.  Al looked him over.  He looked dirty and tired.

“Is that all your clothes?” Al asked, gesturing at the bags.

“Yeah,” said Llewyn.

Al told him, “You’re gonna wash ‘em in the morning.  All of them.  You’re a fuckin’ mess, and I ain’t lettin’ you stay with me unless you clean yourself up.”

“Fine,” said Llewyn.  His eyes had gone kind of flat and resentful, and Al wondered if he’d hurt Llewyn’s feelings.  It was _true_ though, Llewyn looked awful, and that made Al feel worse than hurting his feelings did.

“Take those off too,” Al ordered, “what you’re wearing now.”  Llewyn didn’t say anything, but he obeyed.  When he glanced up at Al as he shimmied his baggy pants off, Llewyn’s eyes had become more sultry than resentful.

“What’re you gonna make me do?” Llewyn asked.  Al watched him strip off his shirt then looked away when Llewyn pulled his underwear down.

“Take a shower.  Like I said, you’re a mess,” muttered Al.

“Is that _all_?”  Llewyn sounded testy, and Al gritted his teeth.  Here he was, giving Llewyn a place to crash and a chance to clean up, and the little prick was copping an attitude.

_I told myself I wasn’t gonna put up with shit like that anymore,_ Al thought.  _That I wasn’t gonna let him treat me like Lizzie and Johnny and everyone else did._

He growled, “Go start the fuckin’ shower and wait for me.  Don’t get in.”  Llewyn’s eyebrows lifted slightly in confusion, but he nodded—kind of submissively, in fact—and went naked down the hall to the bathroom.  Al watched him go, watched the way his ass moved as he walked, then started stripping his own clothes off once Llewyn disappeared into the bathroom.  Al hadn’t intended to shower with Llewyn, but now that Llewyn’s pissy attitude had gotten to him, it sounded like a good idea.

_Can’t trust him to do it on his own,_ Al told himself as he dropped his hat on the kitchen table and stepped out of his boots.  _He won’t get clean enough, he’s such a lazy little shit._   Thinking about cleaning Llewyn up had Al halfway hard by the time he got his tight Wranglers unzipped and worked down to the floor.  Al frowned at his lanky, pale body, then followed Llewyn down the hall to the bathroom.

Llewyn had done as he was told and started the shower.  Now he was leaning over the sink, brushing his teeth.  As Al came into the bathroom, Llewyn spat into the sink and rinsed his mouth.

“I opened the new toothbrush you had in the medicine cabinet,” Llewyn said.

Al actually bought the toothbrush for Llewyn to use, but he scowled.  “What’d I say about asking before you take my shit?”

Llewyn glared back and retorted, “I thought that applied to your cigarettes and your booze and your food.  Not your fuckin’ toothbrushes.”

Al smacked Llewyn’s bare ass, hard.  He didn’t think it through first, but Llewyn’s entitled attitude pissed him off, and Llewyn was still sort of bending over so his ass stuck out anyway.  He yelped and straightened up, rubbing at the swiftly reddening handprint on his backside.

“What the fuck, is that how I get punished?” Llewyn squawked.  “You fuckin’ _spank_ me?”

“If you’re lucky,” said Al.  “I’m going easy on you this time, since at least you’re improving your hygiene.”  He moved Llewyn away from the sink to brush his own teeth, with his own toothbrush, because thinking about Llewyn’s mouth being clean made Al want to kiss him.  He wasn’t sure if Llewyn would be into that, but he hadn’t complained about it the other day.

“I still can’t get over how fuckin’ hung you are,” Llewyn said as he watched Al.  “You look like a string bean when you’re dressed, but naked, you’re like. . . .”  He trailed off, then shrugged.  Al glowered at him through the mirror, insulted over the string bean thing, but Llewyn met his eyes with lowered lids and continued, “I’m impressed.  You look good, Al.”

Al rinsed out his mouth and ordered, “Get in the shower.”

Llewyn got in, and Al stepped in behind him, with Llewyn in between him and the showerhead.  Llewyn faced him and looked up.

“You gonna fuck me after I clean up?” he asked.

Al wanted to, especially after getting his hand on Llewyn’s surprisingly soft ass just then, but the smaller man still looked tired.  His pretty eyes were ringed with dark circles (from exhaustion this time instead of a fist), and Al thought their lids were drooping now out of drowsiness and not seductiveness.

“No,” said Al.  “And you ain’t cleaning up.  _I’m_ gonna clean you up, then I’m putting you to bed.”

“On the couch?” Llewyn murmured.

Al shook his head and reached for the shampoo.  “In the bed.  If. . . if you want to,” he added as he squirted shampoo in his hand, then raked it through Llewyn’s hair.  “You can sleep on the couch if you’d rather.  You don’t have to sleep with me.”

Llewyn replied, “I’d rather sleep in the bed, but why not fuck me first?”  He looked up at Al again, tilting his head back.  Al had to crane forward to reach all of Llewyn’s hair as he scrubbed his fingers gently through the limp curls.  Llewyn didn’t ask why Al was bathing him, and he didn’t fight it.

Al muttered, “Because you look like you’re about to pass out.  You gotta get some sleep.”  He grasped Llewyn’s shoulders and steered him backwards under the spray of water to rinse his hair.  “Where’d you sleep last night?”

“Rode the subway all night.  I dozed some.”  Llewyn picked up the washcloth Al had hung on the side of the tub, soaked it under the showerhead, then handed it to Al.  “Here.”

Al rubbed the washcloth on his bar of soap.  He took Llewyn’s chin in his hand to hold his head still while Al washed his face.  Llewyn’s beard had gotten scraggly, but Al didn’t care much about that as long as it was clean.  Llewyn stared up at him until Al rinsed out the washcloth and splashed water on his face; then he closed his eyes to keep the soap out of them.

“You’re not just being a tease, are you?” Llewyn mumbled as the water ran over his lips.  “You _are_ gonna fuck me one of these days?”

“I’m gonna fuck you in the morning,” said Al.  He got more soap on the cloth and reached both hands behind Llewyn to rub the washcloth over his ass.  “Long as you behave yourself tonight.”

Llewyn whispered, “I’ll behave, Al.”  He started to lean against Al’s chest, then paused and asked: “Can I touch you?”

“Yeah,” Al whispered back.  Llewyn lifted his hands to Al’s chest and rubbed them over his pecs, pausing to thumb his nipples.  Al hissed as they stiffened.

“Thanks for caring,” muttered Llewyn.  “About me being tired, I mean.  I don’t really wanna fuck tonight, long as you’ll do me in the morning.”

“I’ll do you good, baby, I promise,” breathed Al.  He squeezed and rubbed Llewyn’s ass, then finally tore his hands away to soap Llewyn’s back.  Llewyn slid his arms around Al’s shoulders and leaned against his chest while Al managed to wash most of his body and his thighs.  When he had finished, Al dropped the washcloth to the shower floor and rubbed his bare hand over the soap.  He reached between Llewyn’s legs to stroke his cock, slowly.

“Fuck,” Llewyn moaned and bucked into Al’s hand as he got harder.

Al bent his head forward and murmured against Llewyn’s ear, “Why didn’t you come over last night, if you didn’t have anywhere to go?”

“I dunno.”  Llewyn’s voice trembled as Al worked his cock with one hand and began soaping his balls with the other.  “I wasn’t sure you really wanted me to come back.  Wasn’t sure I wanted to follow any rules, either.”

Al paused his bathing and thought about that before he asked, “You’re sure now?”  He felt Llewyn nod, chin on his shoulder.

“Yeah.  I can do rules.  Or else handle whatever punishment you come up with.”

Al’s lips and teeth brushed Llewyn’s ear as he growled, “That sounds like a challenge.  You’re gonna test me, ain’t you?  Make me show you who’s boss.”  He let go of Llewyn’s balls so he could smack his ass again.  Llewyn groaned and dug his fingertips into Al’s back.

He nipped at Al’s neck and hissed, “Yeah, you’re gonna have to teach me, Al, make me behave.”

Al had gotten hard, and he moved his hand away from Llewyn’s groin so he could rub their cocks together instead.  He gripped Llewyn’s ass with both hands and started grinding on him, and Llewyn clutched him and ground back.  Al slid his soapy fingers down into the crack of Llewyn’s ass and rubbed them up and down to wash him there, and Llewyn made a sound almost like a whimper.

“Please,” he whispered, “Al, please, get me off?”

Al pulled his hand back and splashed water over Llewyn’s ass to rinse away the soap; then he shoved his hand between their bodies to coat his fingers in the precum they both were leaking.

“Okay, but only since you asked so pretty,” Al told him.  Llewyn made desperate noises when Al pushed his fingers back down and brushed the tip of one against his asshole.  Llewyn started bucking into Al in a fucking motion and whining.

“Please,” he gasped, “please, Al— _fuuuuck_!”  He finished in a yelp when Al’s finger penetrated him to the second knuckle.  Al froze, afraid he’d hurt Llewyn, but then Llewyn started up the needy whining again.  Al thrust his finger in the rest of the way, fucked Llewyn with it for a few strokes, then pulled it out to add a second in with it.  Llewyn bit down on Al’s neck, not hard but just enough to muffle his groaning a little as Al drove his fingers in and out, twisting them on each thrust.

When Llewyn quit grinding on him, Al thought maybe his legs had gone weak.  In fact, Llewyn was clinging to his shoulders like Al was the only thing holding him up.  Al turned their bodies so he could shove Llewyn’s upper back up against the shower wall and hold him up while Al kept rubbing their cocks together.  That made the finger-fucking awkward, so Al pulled out his fingers—Llewyn whined louder than ever in protest—and boosted Llewyn’s thigh up over his own upper arm.  This accomplished, Al shoved three fingers in deep.  Llewyn yowled; then when Al found his prostate and rubbed it, Llewyn keened.  Al ground on him hard, and after about thirty seconds, he felt Llewyn clamp down around his fingers and spurt cum between their bodies.

Llewyn howled something that might have been Al’s name as he climaxed.  Hearing that, feeling the quivering of Llewyn’s muscles and the heat of the cum he unloaded, Al realized he was close too, and he redoubled his efforts.  As he relaxed after his orgasm, Llewyn’s body seemed to go completely pliable, tense abdominal muscles softening while Al kept rubbing his cock against them.  For a second, Al thought maybe Llewyn had actually passed out, and he looked down into the smaller man’s face with alarm.  It was slack, but only with what looked like sheer bliss rather than unconsciousness.  That was what got Al off, knowing he had made Llewyn feel _that_ good.

Al held Llewyn against the wall and himself against Llewyn.  He thrust on the smaller man with quick little jerks as he came and his cum mixed with Llewyn’s on their stomachs.  Al finished quickly then worked his fingers out of Llewyn’s ass while the smaller man squirmed and whined.  Al couldn’t tell if he was whining because it didn’t feel good, or because it did.

When he was sure Llewyn wasn’t going to topple over if he let go, Al bent down to retrieve the washcloth and cleaned them both up.  Llewyn leaned back against the shower wall with his eyes closed.  He made no effort to help or even to move until Al shut the water off and got out of the shower.  Llewyn finally stirred and climbed out after Al, and he looked so bedraggled and tired and _cute_ , Al forgave him his laziness.

Al tugged a towel off the rack and wiped himself down quickly, then grabbed another and started drying Llewyn, beginning with his face.  Llewyn gazed up at him as he did it, eyes nearly closed with just a glitter visible under his lashes.  Al scrubbed the towel over his head, and Llewyn’s hair sprung up into black curls once the worst of the water got absorbed.  He looked half-asleep but satisfied.

Al wrapped the towel around Llewyn’s shoulders to dry them but ended up using it to pull the smaller man’s wet body against his instead—not for any sexual reason, but just because Al wanted to hold him.  He wasn’t sure Llewyn would allow it, but Llewyn wrapped his arms around Al’s shoulders again and leaned up towards his face.  Al bent his head and kissed Llewyn deeply with a low groan into his warm mouth.  Llewyn gripped a handful of Al’s hair and held his head down while he sucked on Al’s tongue.

But then Llewyn broke the kiss for a long yawn, and Al reluctantly let go and pushed the towel into Llewyn’s hands.  While Al dried himself again and hung up his own towel, Llewyn rubbed his over his body and dropped it on the floor.

“Pick that up,” Al scolded him, “and hang it on the rack.”  Llewyn muttered something under his breath, and Al gave his ass another swat on the way out of the bathroom.

Llewyn followed him into the bedroom after a minute, as Al was pulling back the covers on his bed.  It was a double, with enough room for both of them but not much to spare considering how tall Al was.  Al started to get in, but he stopped and looked back at Llewyn.

Al asked, “Hey, do you want something to eat before we go to bed?  I’m sorry, I forgot to ask.”

Llewyn raised his eyebrows with a slight smirk and said, “You’re so fuckin’ weird, Al.  You push me around, give me all these rules. . . then worry about me being tired and hungry.  You’re too—too _nice_.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Al grumbled.  He climbed into the bed, which creaked under his weight.

“For Chrissakes, don’t get bitchy,” muttered Llewyn.  He switched the light off, and while Al’s eyes were sightless in the sudden darkness, Llewyn got into bed beside him, still muttering, “And I don’t want anything to eat, I just wanna sleep.  Fuckin’ worn out.”

They lay in silence for a moment, stretched out on their backs side by side without touching, before Al said, “You’re the bitchy one.  Bitchier than my ex.”

“Your ex?  You broke up with your girlfriend?” Llewyn mumbled.  He already sounded half asleep.  “Or s’this a different one?”

“I broke up with her.  She’s the only ex-girlfriend I got,” said Al.  Llewyn yawned, and Al felt him turn over onto his side, facing away.

Llewyn asked through another yawn, “Why’d you dump her?  ‘Cos she’s a bitch?”

“Yeah,” said Al, then, “No.  Not just that.  Also ‘cos it wasn’t fair.”  Llewyn didn’t say anything, and Al guessed he’d fallen asleep.  Al kept talking anyway, because he didn’t have anyone else to tell it to.

“It wasn’t fair to her, me foolin’ around with you.  And how she treated me wasn’t fair to _me_.  She treated me like shit.”  Then Al sighed and admitted the real truth of it all: “And it wasn’t fair to _you_.  I know you don’t care, I know I don’t mean shit to you, but I’m gonna do right by you.  I’ll be good to you, Llewyn, I swear.”

Now that his eyes had adjusted to the dim light coming in from the street outside, Al rolled onto his side to look at the back of Llewyn’s head.  Al could just make out the tangle of dark, damp hair.  He slid his hand up over the sheet towards Llewyn’s pillow, hesitated, then pushed his fingertips into the tousle of black curls.  Al trailed his fingers through Llewyn’s hair and down the smaller man’s bare back.  Llewyn’s skin felt smooth and warm beneath his fingertips.

_This is dangerous,_ Al thought.

He lifted his head and leaned forward to kiss Llewyn’s right shoulder, then the side of his neck, then his hair.

As he did so, Al told himself, _He’s never gonna want a real relationship.  It’s always gonna be him coming by when he needs something or wants to get laid and can’t find anybody better.  He’s never gonna want me for me—and I’ll always let him in anyway, ‘cos I’ll take whatever I can get from him._

Al closed his eyes and pressed his face into Llewyn’s hair for a second before he pulled away.  Al turned over so that his back was to the other man, as if that could remove all the temptation to take Llewyn into his arms and hold him as he slept.

\--

To be continued


	4. Chapter 4

The next day was Sunday, so Al slept in.  When he finally woke up around eleven, Llewyn was still asleep, curled up tight and warm against Al’s back.  Remembering what Llewyn had said about dozing on the subway, Al decided to let him sleep.

Al crept out of bed to use the bathroom; then he meant to go make something for breakfast.  But he stopped in the bedroom doorway to check on Llewyn first, and after standing there looking at him, Al got back in bed facing Llewyn and took the smaller man in his arms.

_Just for a minute,_ he told himself, but Llewyn stirred and yawned.

“Al?”

“Morning,” Al mumbled.

“Oh.  It’s morning.”  Although Llewyn sounded disgruntled about it, he snaked an arm around Al’s shoulder and pulled himself closer.  He uncurled his body and rubbed up against Al languidly, like a cat.

“Barely.  It’s, it’s almost noon,” said Al with a shudder when Llewyn’s thigh brushed his cock.

“Mmn,” said Llewyn.  He had his face buried in Al’s chest.  Al raked a hand through Llewyn’s hair then dropped it to his back.  Llewyn’s skin was warm there.

“You want breakfast?” Al asked.

Llewyn yawned again, breath hot on Al’s chest.  “Yeah, ‘m hungry.”  He paused, then added, “After we fuck, though.  I’m not following all those rules of yours anymore if you’re just gonna be a cocktease.”

Al laughed awkwardly and protested, “I ain’t teasing you!  And even if I was, it ain’t your cock I’m gonna fuck.”

“ _Fine_ , you’re being an ass-tease.”  Llewyn pulled away from Al to sit up and looked down at him with his hair all rumpled.  His mouth was smiling, a little, but his eyes had the needy look in them as Llewyn reminded Al, “You promised.”

“I always keep my promises, Llew,” Al murmured, staring up into those pretty eyes.  “I’ll fuck you right now.”

“All right,” Llewyn relented.  “I’ll be right back, okay?”  After he slid out of bed and left for the bathroom, Al leaned over and rummaged around in his nightstand for lube and condoms; then he sat there in bed waiting and feeling nervous.  Finally, Llewyn returned and crawled back into bed.

“You’re not hard,” Llewyn observed as he sat up facing Al.  Al decided to reassert his authority, and with that, some of his nervousness faded.

“That’s your job,” he told Llewyn.  “You want me to fuck you, you gotta get me hard, make me want you.”  A flicker moved over Llewyn’s face, like maybe he was offended, but then it softened, and he moved to straddle Al’s lap.  Llewyn leaned in and kissed the side of Al’s neck, open-mouthed.  Al drew in his breath as he tilted his head away from Llewyn to expose more of his neck.  Llewyn bit and sucked his way down Al’s long neck to his collarbone, where he left a hickey while bringing up both hands to rub Al’s chest.

“Mmn, you’re so _big_ ,” Llewyn breathed, spreading his small hands over Al’s pecs.  “Everything about you.”

“That’s not necessarily a compli—L-llew. . . .”  Al’s complaint dissolved when Llewyn started rubbing his nipples with the heels of his hands.

As he rubbed, Llewyn retorted, “Is _so_ a compliment, Al.  Quit trying to make me into a jerk.”

“I’m not— _fuck_!”  To shut Al up, Llewyn leaned down and sucked on one nipple.  That finished the job of getting Al hard, since the kissing and rubbing had him more than halfway there.  Llewyn shifted his head to suck the other nipple briefly before straightening up and grinding himself against Al’s cock with a satisfied sound.

“You’re easy to work up, so responsive,” Llewyn observed with a little laugh that made Al feel a bit guilty, or maybe just dirty.  Yet Llewyn felt too good in his lap for Al to suffer from much compunction.  He put his hands on the smaller man’s hips and thrust against Llewyn’s abdomen.

Llewyn gasped and whined, “Get me ready and fuck me, Al. . . please,” as if the last word were an afterthought.  Being submissive must be difficult for someone of Llewyn’s ego, as difficult as it was for Al to be aggressive, and Al was sort of proud of them both for pulling it off.  Still holding Llewyn with one hand, he reached for the lube with the other, then reluctantly let go of the other man and fumbled with the tube until he got his two fingers slicked up.  When Al pushed one finger in, Llewyn fairly purred.

“Just like that,” he whispered, leaning in to Al’s chest.  “Please, give me more. . . .”  Al added the second finger, and Llewyn pushed back against his hand to take them as deep as he could.

“Damn, Llew,” Al whispered back as he fucked Llewyn slowly with both fingers.  “You really want it, don’t you?  You’re opening right up.”

Llewyn whimpered, “Yeah, I need it, Al, need you inside me.  I’ve been good for you, just like you wanted.”

“You’ve been very good,” Al assured him.  He spread his fingers a little, stretching Llewyn further and making him groan.

“Please, Al, _please_ ,” he whined.  “I’m ready, and you’re still teasing me.”

“Easy, baby, I’m gonna take care of you.”  Al pulled his fingers free and stroked some lube onto his cock before positioning Llewyn above it and coaxing him, “Okay, go on and take it.”  Llewyn lowered himself onto Al’s cock, and Al had to grit his teeth to keep control of himself when he felt the tightness and heat of Llewyn’s ass enveloping him.

“Fuck, yes,” hissed Llewyn.  He began to ride Al, nearly bouncing up and down in his lap while Al gripped his hips.  At first, Al had to concentrate on trying not to come; Llewyn felt that good.  Then finally, he was able to start thrusting up in time to Llewyn’s movements.  Llewyn’s whimpers and moans came louder and faster, and he clung to Al’s shoulders with both arms.

“Deeper,” he gasped, “please Al, fuck me deeper.”

Al briefly considered reminding Llewyn who was in charge, but he really didn’t care anymore—all that mattered was being with Llewyn.  He tried to drive in deeper and couldn’t, so he wrapped his arms around the smaller man’s waist and rose up on his knees.  Llewyn squawked until Al leaned forward and laid him down on his back, grasped his thighs to raise and spread them, and resumed fucking him.  When Al reached new depths inside him, Llewyn cried out and rocked his ass up for more.

Al looked down into Llewyn’s face.  His pretty eyes with their long lashes were closed, and his mouth was open as he drew in quick, shallow breaths.  Al’s heart pounded with mixed affection and lust for the man underneath him.

“You feel so fuckin’ big,” gasped Llewyn.  He clenched around Al’s cock, and Al shuddered.

“G-gonna come if you keep that up,” he warned Llewyn, who smirked—still with his eyes closed—and began clenching and releasing his muscles in rhythm with Al’s thrusts.

“I’m too much for—for you, yeah?”  Finally Llewyn opened his eyes and gloated up at Al.  Al gritted his teeth and pulled out.  Llewyn’s eyes widened, and he swore, “Fuck, _fuck_ , don’t stop!  _Al!_ ”

“If you’re gonna be mean, I ain’t gonna fuck you,” Al declared, even though stopping was the last thing he wanted to do.

Llewyn whined, “You’re too damn sensitive!  Put it back in, _please!_ ”  He gripped the backs of his thighs and pulled his legs up to show Al what he was missing.

Al’s voice nearly broke as he ordered, “Only if you promise to stop insulting me.”

“I wasn’t—fine, _fine,_ I promise!”  Llewyn’s face and voice softened, and Al couldn’t tell if he meant it or just wanted to get off when he said, “I’m sorry, Al.”

“That’s better,” Al muttered.  He grabbed Llewyn’s ass with both hands and squeezed it, then repositioned himself and pushed back in.  Llewyn arched his back with a whimper of pleasure when Al started thrusting again.  He fucked Llewyn until he really was about to come, then wrapped his hand around Llewyn’s cock and started jerking him.

Al demanded, “Come for me!” as Llewyn tried to thrust down on his cock and up into his fist at the same time.  Llewyn nodded and opened his mouth like he was about to reply, but then he only moaned as he started to ejaculate in Al’s fist.  Al kept pumping Llewyn as best he could, although most of his attention focused on the sensation of Llewyn’s ass tightening as he came.  Al thrust in a couple more times before he came too, hard and deep inside the smaller man.

Llewyn finished first and flopped on his back with his eyes shut to catch his breath.  After Al was done, he pulled out slowly and looked down at his partner lying there with Llewyn’s own cum on his chest.  Al leaned over him, intending to bend down to kiss his parted lips.

Al hadn’t quite gotten there when Llewyn said, without opening his eyes, “Okay, _now_ I want breakfast.”

\--

“So what d’you have to eat around here?” Llewyn asked as he came into the kitchen wearing one of Al’s shirts like a dress.  He’d cleaned up in the bathroom after Al did, and Al was peering into the refrigerator and pondering that very question himself.

“Eggs,” Al replied gruffly.  “That’s it, so I hope you like ‘em.”

“Of course I like eggs, but that’s really all you got?”  Llewyn came up behind Al and pushed him aside to look into the fridge himself.  “You lied, there’s milk.”

“Milk ain’t food, Llewyn.”  Al slouched down in one of the kitchen chairs and watched Llewyn pull the milk and eggs and butter out of the refrigerator.  He added, “Don’t go making a mess.  What’re you doing, anyway?”

“I’m making you breakfast,” Llewyn retorted.  He clattered around in the nearly empty refrigerator and produced what had once been cheese, grumbling, “Thought you said you worked in a grocery store.”

“I do.”

“So why don’t you get food more often?  Your cheese is moldy.”

“I don’t buy much food ‘cos I ain’t running a restaurant,” Al shot back.  Llewyn didn’t seem to hear.

“I’ll cut the moldy part off, there’s gotta be cheese in here somewhere,” he muttered.

Al gave up and let Llewyn have the run of his kitchen.  He got up, retrieved Llewyn’s bag from in front of the sofa, and dropped it by the door.  Then he collected the clothes Llewyn had been wearing the night before and piled those on top of his bag.

“If you’re kicking me out, at least wait until after I’ve eaten,” said Llewyn.  He was doing something on the stove involving a frying pan.

“I ain’t, I’m getting your laundry together,” said Al.  He went to his bedroom to find the shirt Llewyn had left behind the morning he blew Al at the table.  When Al came back to add it to the pile, he told Llewyn, “You’re washing all this right after breakfast.  Oh and do you still got my shirt, the one you borrowed?”

Llewyn argued, “I didn’t borrow it, you put it on me.”  He jogged from the stove over to the spice rack Al’s mother had given him, grabbed three jars, and jogged back.  Al heard him mutter, “Fourteen kinds of seasonings but no food except moldy cheese.  Christ.”

Al demanded, “Do you got it or not?  I don’t care who put it on you, you left wearing it.”

Llewyn made a vague gesture towards his bag.  “It should be in there somewhere.  That’s all my shit in that bag.”

“It better be, and you better wash it.”  Al started some coffee brewing, and when he turned to look back at Llewyn, the smaller man was watching him.

“What’re you so grumpy about?” Llewyn asked.  “What’d I do wrong this time?”

Al sighed and thought, _I didn’t get to kiss you._   Aloud he said, “You didn’t do nothing wrong, I just ain’t a morning person.  I’m sorry, Llew.”

Llewyn made a “hmph” sound and turned back to the stove; then he mumbled, “It’s okay.  I just thought—never mind.”

“You just thought what?”

“Nothing.  You got any clean plates?  Omelet’s done.”

“Is that what you’re making over there?  Hang on.”  Al got up and found two plates to put on the table, along with a couple mugs.  Llewyn carried the skillet over, cut its eggy contents in half, and slid a half onto each of their plates.

“That smells good,” Al admitted.  “I didn’t know I had the stuff to make that.”

“It’s just eggs, milk, butter.”  Llewyn set the skillet down on the stove.  “Cheese.  You got plenty of spices, and there was an onion with a sprout coming out of it.”  He sat down at the table, and Al poured them coffee.

When Al sat down too, he asked again, “What were you gonna say?  You thought what?”

Llewyn had his head bent over his plate, and he glared at Al from under his dark brows before he looked away and muttered, “I thought maybe it wasn’t good for you.  And that’s why you’re pissed at me.”

“I ain’t pissed at you!”  The words came out muffled around a mouthful of omelet.  “And it _was_ good.  You’re—it was. . . really good.  Uh, did you—was it what you wanted?”

Llewyn nodded and murmured into his coffee, “Yeah.  You fuck good, Al.”

After they finished eating, Al said, “Thank you for making breakfast, Llewyn.  It tasted great.”

“Yeah.  You’re welcome,” said Llewyn.

“I didn’t know you could cook,” Al told him as he carried their dishes to the sink and ran hot water to wash them.

“I’m full of surprises.  Do you want me to wash those?”

Al was surprised Llewyn had offered, but he shook his head and said, “No, I’ll do it.  The washer and dryer’s in the basement if you wanna get started on your laundry.”  Al paused then added with a grin, “But put some pants on first.  Not everyone likes looking at your ass as much as I do.”

Llewyn actually blushed, a little, but he matched Al’s smile and announced, “Anyone who doesn’t want to look at my ass, doesn’t know what they’re missing.”

After Al finished the dishes, and in between Llewyn’s trips to and from the basement, they sat on the couch and smoked and listened to music and talked.  Llewyn didn’t need much coaxing to get out his guitar and sing, while Al watched him and thought about how beautiful Llewyn looked and sounded.  Al ignored all the warnings he’d given himself the night before—that Llewyn was only interested in food and shelter and sex, not in Al Cody (and especially not in Arthur Milgrum); that one day Llewyn would leave and never come back; that falling in love with Llewyn was a sure way to get his heart broken.  Instead of keeping his guard up, Al passed the hours getting to know Llewyn better and falling for him even harder, and he couldn’t remember ever being happier than he was that day.

Around dinner time, Al went out for Chinese food.  He and Llewyn ate it off the coffee table with the television on, and Llewyn asked about the lamp on the end table, made from a Courvoisier bottle.

“It was my dad’s, and he gave it to me when I moved out,” Al muttered.  “I don’t like it, but I needed another lamp.”

Llewyn observed, “Your dad sounds like a lot of fun if he drank cognac out of bottles big enough to turn into lamps.”

“We don’t get along,” said Al, and Llewyn nodded.

“I know how that is.  Or I did,” Llewyn said.  He pushed his empty takeout box around, then sat back on the sofa.  “He doesn’t know who I am anymore.”

Al decided Llewyn meant it literally and not figuratively.  He said, “I’m sorry.”

Llewyn shrugged.  “It was a long time coming, and like you were saying, we didn’t get along.  My sister gets after me for not going to see him enough, but what’s the point?”

“I’m sorry,” Al said again.  Llewyn looked at him.

“It’s not your fault, Al,” he said after a minute.

“I know, but I mean it,” Al replied with some frustration.  “I’m sorry you’ve had a bad time.  You don’t deserve it.”

Llewyn shrugged again and said, “I probably do.  But you’re nice to listen.”

“I want to.  I want you to talk to me, Llewyn.”

Llewyn drew his eyebrows together in confusion, and a little crease appeared in the skin between them.

Al tried to explain, “Or to feel like you _can_ talk to me, if you want to.”

“You’re nice, Al,” Llewyn finally said.

Al cleaned up their trash from dinner and ironed the shirt Llewyn had brought back.  Llewyn lay on the couch and plucked at his guitar, and he declined the offer when Al asked if he wanted to use the iron.  However, he accepted a drink when Al offered that; then he suggested Al get his guitar so they could play together.

“Just in case we do ever go on tour,” Llewyn said with half a smirk.

Near midnight, Al put his guitar down and said, “I gotta get some sleep, I gotta open at seven tomorrow.”

“Yeah?”  Llewyn strummed a couple more chords, then put his instrument aside too.  “Am I invited?”

“To go to work with me?”

Llewyn gave Al one of those looks that was not only confused but also a little derisive.  “No, to bed.”

“Oh—yeah.  But we can’t start fooling around, I need to sleep,” Al told him.  He got up from the couch, and Llewyn followed him back to the bedroom, where Llewyn stripped off his clothes and climbed into bed while ignoring the tortured expression on Al’s face.

Once Al got in bed and switched off the light, Llewyn turned his back to him and announced, “Night, Al.”

“G’night,” Al mumbled.  He stayed on his back and closed his eyes, trying to forget that Llewyn lay beside him.  Then, just as sleep drew close, he felt Llewyn turn over and came wide awake again.  All was quiet for a moment, then:

“Al?”  Llewyn spoke in a whisper.  “You awake?”

“Yes,” Al whispered back.  “What is it?”

“Nothing.”

Al waited, and when no further response came, he put out his hand and felt around for Llewyn in the dark.  His hand landed on Llewyn’s upper arm, which Al squeezed.

“You sure?”

Llewyn mumbled, “I’m sure.  You need to go to sleep.”

“Then why’d you ask if I was awake?”  Al rubbed the back of Llewyn’s arm, then slid his hand around the smaller man’s shoulders.

Instead of answering, Llewyn charged, “You said we couldn’t start fooling around because you had to sleep.”

“I ain’t fooling around, I just—I want to hold you.”  It was easier to admit it in the darkness, where he didn’t have to see if Llewyn gave him that derisive look again.  Al tugged at Llewyn’s shoulders, coaxing him closer, and after a second, Llewyn slid up against him and into his arms.

“You’re warm,” Llewyn observed.

“Yeah.  This is better than sleeping in the subway, ain’t it?”  Al stroked his fingers through Llewyn’s curly hair and bent his head to kiss it.  Llewyn didn’t reply, only lay still exhaling quick breaths against Al’s neck; then he tilted his face up and caught Al’s lips.  Al moaned into Llewyn’s mouth and kissed him thoroughly.

When Al’s alarm woke him up the next morning, he was alone in bed.  He yawned, dragged himself up, and started for the shower.  Seeing that Llewyn wasn’t in the bathroom, Al frowned.  In the kitchen making breakfast again?  Al checked.  No Llewyn.  He was gone.

_You knew this would happen,_ the sensible part of Al’s brain scolded the rest of him.  _You knew he’d never stay, and you went and fell for him anyway.  You knew it was going to hurt—and it does._

As he trudged back toward the bathroom, Al glanced over at the sofa.  He’d already looked to be sure Llewyn wasn’t asleep on it, but now he noticed that there _was_ something on the floor beside it: a pile of Llewyn’s clean laundry.  Wherever he’d gone, Llewyn had taken his guitar but left most everything else behind.

With renewed hope, Al hurried off to get ready for work.

\--

To be continued


	5. Chapter 5

After a couple of days, Llewyn came back.  Al didn’t ask where he’d been, and Llewyn didn’t offer an explanation.  He spent the night with Al and left again the next day, which became a pattern over the next few weeks: Llewyn would stay a night or two, then disappear for three or four days.  Al gave him the spare key, so Llewyn could let himself in if Al wasn’t home.

Sometimes Llewyn asked Al to come to his gigs, and sometimes he went to Al’s.  Sometimes they stayed in at Al’s apartment.  Sometimes Llewyn would leave after Al woke up and before he left for work, and sometimes Al would wake up or come home to an empty apartment.

When a month had gone by, Al realized that Llewyn was staying two or three nights at a time instead of one or two, and that he came back after two days instead of three or four.  One evening, Al got in from work to find the apartment empty and a note under the ashtray on his kitchen table.  His heart pounded with fear and nerves until he read it:

_Al,_

_Got to play some stupid party tonight.  You’d hate it, so I’ll see you later.  I left you a sandwich in the fridge._

_Llew_

The note puzzled Al since Llewyn had never bothered to leave one before, but he appreciated it, as well as the sandwich.  Llewyn returned the next day, and Al tried not to wonder where he’d spent the night, just like he tried not to wonder who else Llewyn was sleeping with.  In bed that night, he held Llewyn close, and Llewyn fell asleep in his arms, and he was still there when Al woke up the next morning.

But two weeks after that, Llewyn left and didn’t come back.  He’d left in the morning while Al was home and awake.  Llewyn had taken to doing that, so he could say goodbye to Al and tell him something vague about where he’d be.  This time, Llewyn said he was going to see his father, so Al expected him to come back that night.  He didn’t, and he didn’t come back the next four nights either.

The fifth morning after Llewyn disappeared, Al got up and showered and dressed for work in a haze of mixed depression and worry.  He didn’t _really_ think something disastrous had happened to Llewyn, even though he had vanished and left most of his belongings behind.  _Bad_ things seemed to happen to Llewyn a lot, but he’d pulled through them all.  _Bad_ was different from _disastrous_ , so Llewyn couldn’t have gotten mugged, or pissed off the wrong people, or. . . or killed himself like the friend Llewyn told Al about one night when he was drunk and emotional.

_He wouldn’t do that, he’s got things to live for,_ Al told himself as he walked to the corner grocery where he worked.  _He’s got his music, and he’s got. . . he’s got me._

The early hours passed with Al mechanically serving the weekend customers.  The store was self-service, but Al still had to help people find things, reach the high shelves for short customers, and ring up purchases.  In between duties, he considered shopping himself to restock the fridge, but he thought, _What’s the point?_

Then, around ten, Llewyn came in.  Al’s heart jumped into his throat, and sank right back down again when he realized that a dark-haired woman had followed Llewyn into the store.  Llewyn was saying something to her over his shoulder and laughing, and she was pretty.

_So that’s where he’s been,_ Al thought, feeling stupid first over how worried he’d been, and second over how jealous he felt.

“Al!”  Llewyn had spotted him behind the counter and was making his way over with his hand on the woman’s arm.  “Al, this is Joy.”

“Hi,” said the woman.  “So you’re Llewyn’s friend.”

“Yeah.  Hi.”  Al made himself smile.  “Can I help you with anything?”

“Nah, we’ll get it,” Llewyn said.  Al watched unhappily as they moved around the store gathering staples: bread, eggs, bananas.  Cheese.  Al wondered if Llewyn made omelets for Joy.

When the pair brought their purchases to the counter, Al avoided looking at both of them as he rang everything up.  Everything they bought seemed very domestic.  Al tried to hate Joy and couldn’t, because of course she didn’t know what Llewyn was doing—or _had_ been doing—with Al.  He couldn’t even manage to be angry at Llewyn.  After all, Al had known all along that he could never be enough for him.

“See you later, Al,” Llewyn said as he picked up the paper bag of groceries, after Joy had paid for them.

“Yeah,” Al mumbled.  He glanced up, once, and saw Llewyn smiling at him.  That time, Al just couldn’t make himself smile, so he lifted his hand in a half-wave as he thought, _No you won’t._

\--

Al ended up being angry after he’d had all day to think about Llewyn storing his shit at Al’s apartment while he ran off to spend five days with Joy.  When Al got back to the apartment after work, Llewyn was there, alone.  He was sitting on the couch playing his guitar, but he looked up and smiled at Al when he came in.  Al glared back.

“What’re you doing here?” he growled.  Llewyn stared at him, the smile mutating into a frown.

“What’s with you?  Bad day at work?” Llewyn retorted.

“I knew you were nervy, but this is a shit move even for you,” Al snapped at him, “crashing here after showing up at the store this morning!”

Llewyn put his guitar aside and got to his feet.  He said, “What was wrong with _that_?  I can’t shop where I want to?”

“I don’t care where you shop!  But you don’t need to do it where I’m working if you’re just coming in to flaunt your—your girlfriend in front of me!”

“My _girlfriend_?”  Llewyn gave Al his best bemused, derisive look then began to laugh.

“Whatever the fuck she is—a hook-up or your latest conquest or whatever!”  Al’s voice grew louder to be heard over Llewyn’s laughter, but that ceased abruptly.

Llewyn glowered at Al and charged, “You really think I’m a whore, don’t you?  And you’re _jealous_ over it.”

“I am not!”

“Yeah, you _are_.  That’s why you’re so mad.”

“Why shouldn’t I be mad?” Al argued.  “You didn’t come home for days!  If you were off with her, fine, but to just show up again—”

Llewyn interrupted him.  “Yeah, yeah I was staying with her.  In _her_ apartment!  But what d’you mean, ‘come home’?  This is your home, Al, obviously it’s not _mine_.”

Al hadn’t spoken of “home” intentionally, but now he realized that was indeed how he felt about the apartment.  It was Llewyn’s as much as it was his.  Even if Llewyn didn’t pay the rent or buy the groceries, he cooked the meals and played the guitar there.  They sang together and slept together there.  It was where Llewyn came when he needed to be safe.  Or so Al had believed, anyway.

_But I’m not making it very safe for him now,_ Al thought.  _If I really love him, that should come first—his happiness, not my feelings._   Llewyn was watching him and waiting for some reply to his declaration.  Al looked into his pretty, angry eyes and felt like he was falling apart.

Al managed to say, “I guess—I guess I wanted it to be _our_ home, ‘cos it ain’t the same anymore when you ain’t here.”  He sighed.  “I’m sorry for yelling at you.”

Llewyn’s expression turned bewildered, utterly bewildered without any derision at all, and he asked, “What’re you talking about?”

“I’m sorry,” Al repeated.  “You’re right, I got jealous, thinking about you with someone else.”

Llewyn’s brows furrowed, and he argued, “That wasn’t one of the rules, Al.  You never said—”

Al interrupted him, “I know.  But I can’t do this anymore, I should’ve known I couldn’t.”

“You want me to leave?” Llewyn asked in a raspy voice.  His eyes took on their pleading look, but now, that expression seemed more real than an attempt at simple manipulation.  Llewyn’s eyes looked very bright, somehow.

Al shook his head and mumbled, “I didn’t mean you gotta leave.  You can stay, I _want_ you to stay.  I just. . . I can’t keep sleeping with you, is all.  Or kissing you, or—”  He really did feel like he was about to cry, so he turned away toward the hall before he finished.  “We’re just roommates, okay?  And that’s all, because I can’t stand to share you.”

Llewyn kept quiet for a minute that stretched on forever; then finally, he said, “You’re that serious about me, and you never told me.  This. . . this isn’t what I thought it was, Al.  It’s not fair.”

“I _said_ I was sorry,” Al muttered, still turned away.  “I did try to make it fair at first, when I said you could stay long as you showed some common courtesy.  I didn’t set out to. . . to fall for you.  But it happened.  So you can stay if you want, or you can go.  You do what you gotta do, Llewyn.”

This time, Llewyn didn’t say anything at all, so Al left the room and went down the short hall to the bathroom.  He was dirty from work, and if Llewyn needed time to think, he could have that while Al took a shower.  But Al had barely gotten in the bathroom when he heard the apartment door slam shut, and he knew Llewyn had gone.

\--

Al cried in the shower.  As unmanly as it was, he felt a little better afterwards.  A little better and a little resigned, maybe, to the fact that he’d ruined a good thing.

**_Was_** _it a good thing?_ he asked himself as he got dressed again.  _Yeah. . . it was good.  So good I got greedy and wanted more, wanted something he couldn’t give me._   Al thought that thing was faithfulness until he came back to the living room and saw that Llewyn had left everything behind, including his guitar.  Looking at the guitar that was such a part of Llewyn, understanding that Llewyn had left it only because he had to get away from Al _right then_ , Al realized even faithfulness wouldn’t have satisfied him.  Nothing less than love would have done.

Al left the apartment and went out to the country-western bar, so he wouldn’t be in the way when Llewyn came back for his stuff.  Even that place reminded Al of his loss, because Llewyn had come to hear him play there once.  He’d also tried riding the mechanical bull and landed on his ass after three seconds.  Al had lasted for ten, which for some reason turned Llewyn on.

Remembering all that hurt some, but Al settled in at the bar anyway, and didn’t leave until after midnight.  He was again almost but not quite drunk—not that he didn’t _want_ to get drunk, but he had to work in the morning and knew things would be even worse then if he did.  Back on Downing Street, he remembered coming home the night he found Llewyn on the stoop, waiting for him.  Al almost started crying again, but again, it would have made things even worse.

Llewyn hadn’t come back for his things; they remained jumbled around the couch.  Al drank a glass of water and tried not to think about having to see Llewyn again when he did finally show up.  He stopped by the bathroom on his way to bed, then trudged to the dark bedroom where he undressed and left his own pile of clothes on the floor.  Automatically, Al walked around to what had been his side of the bed when Llewyn was there and got in.

Alcohol and exhaustion would have had Al asleep as soon as he lay down, except a soft, tentative sound jolted him awake again.

“. . . Al?”

Al turned his head toward the other side of the bed and looked at what he’d thought was a pillow wadded up under the blanket.  In the dim light coming from his curtained window, Al saw that the pillow was breathing.

“L-llewyn?”

“Mhm.”

Al’s voice caught, and he had to clear his throat before he asked, “You—you came back?”

“Mhm.”  Finally, Llewyn unfurled himself enough to pull the blanket off his head.  “I was asleep.”

“Sorry I woke you,” Al said stupidly.  “I didn’t, didn’t expect—I thought you were gone.”

“I was.  I needed to think.”  Llewyn rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand then peered at Al.  “But when I was through thinking, I came home.”

“Llewyn,” Al said again.

“Al.  The woman I was with, Joy—she’s my _sister_.  I really was staying with her.  Didn’t I tell you about her before?”

Stunned, Al could hardly make his mouth move to reply, “You. . . you told me you had a sister.  You never told me her name, though.”

“I thought I had.  She needed groceries, so I brought her to your store because I wanted her to meet you.  My friend.”

“Oh,” said Al.  He drew in a long, shaking breath.  “I’m. . . fuck, I’m sorry, Llew.  I thought you were—”

“I know what you thought.”

“I’m sorry,” Al said for the third time.  “And even if she wasn’t your sister, I’d still owe you an apology.  I never should have said what I did.  You were right, it wasn’t fair of me to tell you that I—how I, I feel.  About you.”

“But you did tell me, and that’s what I had to think about,” Llewyn murmured.  “Sometimes I’d wonder, but I wasn’t _sure_.  And I didn’t know how to feel about it.”

Al almost said he was sorry again, but he managed to hold it back.

Llewyn went on, “But once I was out of here and away from you, I decided—this _does_ feel like home, as much of one as I’ve had in a long time.  I wanna stay, Al.  We can be roommates like you want, I’ll go sleep on the couch, but please let me stay.”

“I told you, I _want_ you to stay, Llewyn,” Al promised.  “I like knowing you’re safe and that you have enough to eat and, and all that stuff.  I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable around me because of what I. . . I said.”

“I’m comfortable around you, I’m _too_ comfortable,” Llewyn said with a shaky laugh.  “That’s why this new rule of yours, it’s hard.”

“What new rule?”

“The roommate clause,” said Llewyn.  “No kissing.  No sex.  All that.”

Al mumbled, “Llewyn, I just can’t.”

“Can’t what?  You did all of it just fine last week, and—”

“I can’t share you,” Al blurted out.  “I’m in _love_ with you, Llew.”

“I know that, _now_.  But you should’ve told me, I had no idea.  And Al. . . .”  Llewyn extracted himself from the rest of the blanket and tossed part of it over Al too.  “. . . where did you get the idea that you’ve been ‘sharing’ me?  ‘Cos of Joy?”

“Yeah, and—well, I just assumed.  You like girls too,” Al tried to explain.

“And so do you, but I didn’t assume you were still fucking them,” retorted Llewyn.  “Are you?”

“No, of course not!”  Al was surprised to hear himself chuckle.  “You. . . it’s too good with you.  You’re all I want.”  He fell silent; then everything Llewyn had been saying began to sink in.  “Llew, you mean you ain’t sleeping with anyone else?”

Llewyn sighed, “That’s exactly what I mean.  Not since that day you put your shirt on me.”

“It—that’s a powerful shirt.”

“You’re a dork, Al,” Llewyn laughed softly.  He slid closer to Al under the blanket and went on, “It was good with you, and then you were all I wanted, too.  I guess I just didn’t think much about that until tonight—it just. . . happened.  Kinda like how you became my home.”

“You mean my apartment?”

“No, I mean _you_.”

Although they weren’t touching, Al could feel the warmth of Llewyn’s body under the covers, tantalizing him.  He reached out his arm and put it around Llewyn’s shoulders and, when the smaller man did not protest, drew their bodies together.  Llewyn wrapped his own arm over Al’s back and cuddled into his chest.

“I fell for you too, Al,” Llewyn mumbled against the skin of Al’s neck.  “I might’ve realized it sooner if you’d spoken up.”

“Or you might not have,” Al pointed out.  “Maybe you needed time.”

Al felt Llewyn shrug.  “Maybe.  But about the roommate thing. . . can we drop that since all this was a big misunderstanding?”

“You mean go back to the way things were?”  Al nuzzled Llewyn’s curly hair and smiled to himself, but Llewyn shook his head.

“Not quite.  It’s a hassle staying somewhere else when all my stuff’s here, so I might as well spend every night here.  But yeah, the kissing and fucking, that would go back to normal.”

“You should just stay here every night,” Al agreed.  “Maybe even help out around the place a little more.”

“Fine, fine, I suppose that’s a fair trade,” huffed Llewyn.

“And maybe when you get a little extra money—”

“Help with the rent too?  You put a high price on your love, Al Cody.”  Llewyn belied his words with a sudden, long kiss to Al’s mouth.

“I do love you, Llew,” Al murmured when he could catch his breath.

Llewyn pressed his face into the crook of Al’s neck and muttered, “Thank you for that.  And for everything else you’ve done for me, Al.  I love you too.”

\--

The End


End file.
